No, I'm Not Ready to Talk About It

My inability to post lately has been little cause of concern, I'm sure. However, I still feel the need to fill a void once in awhile, so this post will be vague at best, yet allow me to voice myself without blowing up.

First, but foremost, Blogger and the issue with the enter button is ticking me off. Even though you hit enter the blinking light sits where you last typed. This always confuses me and I end up hitting enter about 10 times before I realize it.

Second, my husband bought me a new laptop. I'm going to cry as soon as it gets here, because I've had my "Gordy" since 2003--since I started this blog and made many, many friends. I can't imagine not starting up Gordy and writing stories or notes to friends.

Third, I'm not mad at my husband. I don't do change well.

Fourth, I'm probably seeming a little "mad" lately. Well, that's probably true. I have a medical condition, but I'm still not ready to discuss it. In fact, only my husband and a few teachers at school know about it. My parents don't even know, yet. Why? Well, I'm not ready to discuss it, and they had to be told so we could make schedule changes as needed. That's the only problem with teaching college courses--you have to have projects, etc., set in stone ahead of time, so if you're going to be absent for a small period of time you have to make sure students will still receive college credit. And, my Dad is having surgery on the 14th for a double hernia--so I figured there's no need to burden my parents with my condition. However, I might be able to tell you more after April 12th.

Fifth, I think there is this woman girl that is trying to compete against me and everything I do. It pisses me off. That's why my Twitter has been so funky lately. I, unfortunately, can't unfriend her from Facebook, but I REALLY want to do so. (If I unfriend her it will cause MAJOR drama for my husband. See--I still love him even though he's making me change laptops.)

Sixth, I teach highschool and see more drama from this one "girl" than what's in the entire high school. I'm not kidding.

Seventh, I like the number 7. I consider it one of my lucky numbers, so I'll stop here. In the next two days I need to make the following: cheesecake, bunny buns, Easter crosses and peanut butter eggs. I had better hop to it!

Ch-Cha-Changes, They Are Coming

Well, it looks like we might only have 1 or 2 days of school this week. Winter be damned! It's been one storm after another, and they're predicting another BLIZZARD around January 20th. Me thinks the city of 0maha won't even have cleared our street off by then. (This is the part where I would usually laugh it up, but unfortunately, this could actually be true.)

At least we met with the kids yesterday for a full school day, and Monday was a teacher in-service. I was very excited on Monday, because one of my teacher goals may come true. IF everything goes right, I will be teaching a college course at the high school, and my students will be able to receive college credit in Written Composition!

 See Mom--that master's degree in English is coming in handy! I got out of teaching broadcast journalism (I HATE IT!), but I will still have 4 different classes to prepare for. And, you know what, I'm okay with that. Now, only if I could find someone to take over the yearbook, I would be in 7th heaven.

Where I've Been

I've been updating on my recipes site, and not really paying any attention to this blog. I find that this blog has provided therapy over the years, but I need it less and less. I'll keep it up--it is a record of the good, the bad, the ugly and the VERY ugly--but if I update about once a month that will be it.

On a high note, I just redyed my hair back to the dark chestnut color with red and blond highlights on the mohawk. And...I won teacher of the month for April--what a stark contrast from 5 years ago!

Keeping Up with My Resolutions

One of the resolutions I made for 2009 was to do something outside of my comfort zone each month. This month I chose to do something that most people would not consider out of the ordinary, but for me and my slight *cough*cough* slight agoraphobia this was a huge step.

While I wish I could say that I stayed away from the dentist office, I can't. Dr. M. and I are now on a first name basis and are trading book titles back and forth. At this point she's also giving me free toothpaste (and not the small tubes, but the large ones!) and free fluoride treatments for me to put on my teeth at home. I guess I learned my lesson the hard way...I used to only brush my teeth once a day...then upgraded to twice. I now brush 2-3 times a day and try to use some type of fluoride treatment. As I have learned...brush your teeth ALL THE FRICKIN' TIME. Especially if you have bad teeth to begin with.

Anyway, on to my original subject: my brush with agoraphobia. I hate going out to public places with people I don't really know (or care for), or in places that I'm not familiar. This past Sunday I did both of those things.

R.School had the faculty supper at St0kes. Since this was a Mexican restaurant (I'll spare you the details about me getting sick), I was nervous regarding my food allergies/tolerances. To top it all off, while I like most of the faculty members I work with, there are some that drive me up the wall. But, Jeff and I went anyway. He had the shrimp pasta (which I do not have a tolerance for) while I had the chicken with (jalapeno!) bbq sauce. We sat with the new English teacher who is a couple years younger than me, and his fiance. It wasn't too bad, and I got some social points in with the faculty.

I did however drink somewhere between 5-6 glasses of iced tea due to my nerves, and had to use the restroom frequently. And, while the salad was quite good (and the croutons to die for!) I became ill from the bbq sauce. It was very hot with jalapenos, which they didn't say anything about when I asked, and had some other spices in it. After I took one bit I couldn't eat anything more. Nothing. Notta. I felt bad for wasting food, but I was sweating and couldn't handle it anymore.

For Fear's Sake

I have a stabbing pain in my heart, that I feel cannot be repaired.

I have been trying to make friends since I moved down here, but it seems next to impossible. The teachers I work with are either way older than I am, or have all of their college friends living near by.

I don't.

My friends live up in South Dakota and Minnesota. So, seeing them during the winter months is almost impossible. Not to mention that they both work jobs where they are on call during the weekends.

Except for the summer, I only have weekends off, and truthfully, I end up working a lot during those weekends for various reasons.

Yet, I still feel lonely.

I've never been able to make friends easily. In fact, I really don't like most people when I first like them. So, just an FYI, if you know me and I'm still talking to you, it means I really do like you. Anyway, because of how picky I am, I haven't had anyone to hang out with in the 2 1/2 years I've lived down here.

Well, I take that back. I did hang out with a couple people a few times, but I found that to be a situation that I didn't believe was healthy. So, while I still talk to that person, I don't hang out with her anymore.

I've been toying with ways to try and find friends, but they never really seem to work. I've thought about joining a book club, but those meet early afternoons or Tuesday nights at 6:30. Um, that does not work for me, because we have a lot of school activities on Tuesday nights. I've also thought about volunteering, but I don't feel like driving down to the bad part of town (and, oh yes, this town has bad parts).

I don't knit very well, so stitch-and-bitch would not work.

Any other ideas??

Oops, better go before I miss the AMAs.

Things I Don't Care About

I'm working on a yearbook deadline, which I guess I technically will miss at the close of business today. Oh well...I suppose I should get motivated.

I haven't been motivated to do anything lately. In fact, I've been going through some nasty insomnia and depression feelings. Why? I'm not quite sure, but I think the aforementioned deadlines have something to do with it.

I used to love deadlines, but only when I know exactly what I'm doing. Being a first-year instructor on the yearbook and teaching freshman leaves me without knowing 3/4 of the student body. That sucks. Also, having to spend 1/2 the year finishing last year's yearbook has left me drained on this one.

I also need to get all of my personal pictures downloaded to the computer and put up on MySpace and Facebook for all of your viewing pleasures. There are some funny stories regarding bison that hate my driving.

Other pictures include me running on the beach on the 4th of July. We decided to have a picnic with my brothers and my parents back in Iowa at the local county park--where my youngest brother works. We met for lunch, and then hiked around the park. I took a couple of artsy pictures, but nothing I would consider to be life changing.

Other than that, I'm avoiding MySpace and Facebook like the plague. A couple of high school classmates have found me on those sites and I, not wanting to hurt anyone's feelings, decided to add them. This has been a challenge, because I don't really talk to anyone from high school, nor do I want them to know anything about my life.

Many of my classmates were self-absorbed, spoiled kids, whose parents grew up in the same town we lived. Thus, since my parents grew up outside of the tiny 500-person town, and we moved there when I was 3, I was an outsider. It didn't help that teachers would often think I was dumb because I didn't have the same last name as 1/2 the other kids at school. I was teased a lot because I liked to read, was clumsy and of course, was chubby. It wasn't until my 6th grade teacher (who didn't give a shit about generational heritage) that I finally started to see some light at the end of the tunnel.

That teacher, Mr. P., put me in the challenging reading groups and had me work on my math skills until I was in the top of that as well. The previous two years of being ignored by the worst teacher ever, had finally been vindicated. I was doing better than most of the kids whose parents grew up in the system--and in only 1/2 a year. Suckers.

Junior high and high school were very easy for me, if not too easy. I never studied, and rarely did homework (except algebra and geometry), which in retrospect was dumb. Even though I graduated with honors, I could have done so much better. But, I was bored and found reading books or writing stories to be much more fun.

But, alas, I didn't have any close friends. I had three or four that I talked to, and hung out with a lot, but none that shared my interests or hobbies. I had a couple of friends in my Odyssey of the Mind group, and Tonya and I have stayed good friends, but she was a year younger than me in school. I also had a few friends from 4-H, but one was 5 years older than me, the other 1 year younger. Also, woodworking and cooking don't always make your friends knock down your door wanting to talk.

I felt alone a lot, caused by my hobbies. But, I don't regret it. I enjoyed working on antique furniture, reading and cooking. It's enhanced my abilities as a writer and storyteller, not to mention it's taught me patience.

Additionally, I've learned to be ambitious. I always knew I would get out of that 500-person town, and go somewhere else.

Did I know I would end up as a teacher with a master's degree in English? NO. I was a political science and drama major my first year of college, and then I met a couple of English professors who changed my mind.

I finally realized that writing/teaching could be a viable life choice. It was like a light turned on in my head and it felt right. I had found the right career--something I had been doing pretty much my entire life, alone.

There's also an air of mysteriousness that I like to create.

One of the two classmate I still talk to I saw at my wedding a couple weeks ago, the other I see on occasion at special events back home. Of course, neither one of those classmates were the ones to add me on MySpace or Facebook.

I'm a very private person in real life. Writing is a totally different experience for me, because it's how I express myself best. Ask my husband; I get tongue-tied when I try to talk about my feelings. But, writing about feelings comes easy--it's a release and I can always delete a sentence if I don't like the way it comes out. It's what I consider a bleep-button for verbal-diarrhea. Anyway, instead of all of my posts on MySpace, I may actually begin to use blogger again.

I am supposed to have a 10-year high school class reunion sometime this month. What day? I'm not sure. The post card, which was mailed to my parent's house, didn't have a date. Instead, it had a time, place (2 bars nonetheless) and an email address for questions. HA! Out of pure, unadulterated facetiousness, I thought about emailing the contact person about the date, but then realized that would corner me into a position of "are you going?"

I don't think they would appreciate a, "HELL NO."

Part of the reason I don't want to go is because I'm proud of the accomplishments I've made for myself. By myself. Earning a BA with a 3.5 GPA, a MA with a 3.8 GPA and reading papers at 2 different conferences. I accomplished more in those two years at graduate school than some professors do in 5 years.

But, in reality, that's not good enough for me--for someone who was once ostracized because her parents didn't grow up in the same town. I want to be at the top of the chain, earning my Ph.D. and living somewhere other than the mid-west. I suppose I'll always be self-conscious because of my adolescent experiences.

The other part is that I really don't care about my classmates, but I did consider going to check out their lives. I've heard rumors that some are now living train-wrecks. I would hate to laugh in their faces.

I guess I do care about them more than I should.

I Don't Know What to Do, It's Nothing New

I have all of these short stories, novels, novellas, poems and God knows what else on my laptop. I work on them in the afternoons, because I have always wanted to be a writer.

However, I love teaching as well, so I thought I would ride the teaching train for awhile and publish when I got my Ph.D.

The more I think about it, though, the more I'm not 100% sure a Ph.D. is helpful in writing books. I mean, I would LOVE the Ph.D., but I'm not going to break the bank for it.

Recently in the online version of the Om@h@ paper, they had links to NE writers guilds and writing groups. I immediately thought, "COOL, I should totally go to the meetings!" But, then the antisocial, hermit in me was like, "Fuck that shit." (Yes, I teach at a Catholic high school and curse like a sailor--I have a curse-free 'teacher mode' while I'm teaching).

I'm thinking I should at least give it a try, but the one group is at 72nd and D0dge on a Friday night right after rush hour. I can imagine how fun that would be to get to!

However, I do want to write...and if I did manage to get something published that would help me get into a Ph.D. program... I hate indecision.

The Cheese Ball Up My Nose

The way I understand it, there are 6 sides to every story.

The way you see it, the way you want to see it and the way you think others see it.

Thus, between a writer and her reader, there's a lot of friggin' people. The reason I say this is because I've been toying with the idea to send in a story of mine to be published.

However, everyone always says there are only 2 sides to a story. But, there's not. I can't get over that fact. What I write can be miscontrued for any number of reasons. So, I have to ask myself, am I ready for the criticism?

Being a student, I was used to it, but I never really looked at a paper when I got it back from a professor. In fact, one of my professors held me back after class one night to give me a "pep talk" regarding my work ethic. I had an A in the class...I kept the A in the class.

Did I listen to her? Nope. I kept on doing what I was doing.

I wonder if criticized for a creative story if I'll continue down the same path, or if I'll change the way I write?

Thus, I ponder.

ALIAS

Another identity...for the new year in *eek* two weeks.

I'm very happy with this cut and color. And, they know me. People know me! They only put semi-permanent dye in because they know I'm always changing the color.

But, I'm happy because it was only 2.5 hours in the salon! (Yes, I know that sounds long, but I go to a teaching-salon, because it's cheap! Cheap! Cheap! and Good!).